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Smart IDs Replace Insurance Booklets

Starting July 22, patients will no longer have to provide their insurance booklets when visiting medical centers owned by or affiliated to the Social Security Organization (SSO), said its director Taqi Nourbakhsh.
“People can receive medical services as well as medication by simply providing their national ID number,” he said Monday, IRNA reported.
At other medical centers in tie-ups with the SSO, patients can get medical services or medications via a new smart ID card system.
As per a bill approved by the Supreme Council of Insurance in 2015, the project to replace insurance booklets with smart cards was piloted last year for cancer patients and those with special or rare diseases in Yazd Province.
It is funded by RighTel Communications, the third largest mobile phone network operator in Iran established by the SSO Investment Company (Shasta) in 2011. It started its expansion and launching of services in 2012 and has covered all provincial centers and many large cities.
Under the project, the two basic insurers, Iran Health Insurance Organization (IHIO) and the SSO, will function as a unified system to avoid dispersion of services and tariffs, said Nourbakhsh.
The format of SSO medical insurance booklets has changed and they can be used by SSO clients till such time they receive their smart ID cards.
The new format incorporates a specific system of communication between healthcare providers while keeping the patient’s information confidential.
“The directive that obliges all medical centers not to mention diagnosis and prognosis in insurance booklets was issued last month by the Health Ministry,” he said.
The SSO is the largest social insurer in Iran which provides medical and pension coverage for wage-earners and the self-employed.
A nongovernmental organization formed in 1975 it is primarily financed by premium contributions (7% by employees/workers, 20-23% by employers and 3% by the government). It also has investments and stakes in several major industrial and commercials sectors. At present, more than 41 million people are under the SSO umbrella.